Sadhguru speaks about his experience at Kanti Sarovar, the glacial lake a few kilometers beyond Kedarnath, where Shiva, the first yogi or Adiyogi, transmitted the yogic sciences to the Saptarishis, over 15,000 years ago. He chants the Nada Brahma chant, and explains how this chant resounded across the lake in his presence. He speaks about the significance of this chant, and also explains the meaning.

Full Transcript:

So once I went – those days, today I just came back from Kailash, from Kailash I went to Australia and back – so today when I travelled there’s a whole Jing-bang going with me, okay too much organization. We got all kinds of boots, we got clothes, we got this thing and the gloves and the works and cars and the works. You can't imagine, too much organization. At that time I just went by myself, by local bus. Generally I sat on top of the bus and went because I didn’t want to miss the mountains. And these are crazy buses. They started four, four-thirty in the morning from Haridwar and go straight to either Gourikund or to Badrinath – they have to get there, so they won't don't stop anywhere. These buses used to be called as Bhook Hartal buses, that means hunger strike buses because they won't stop anywhere for food. The driver opens up his rolled up chapatti and starts eating as he’s driving.

So you are sitting there wondering where is the lunch, where is the lunch, no lunch. So they are called Bhook Hartal. So I went and sat on top of the bus because I don’t want to miss even a bit of the mountain. And electric wires will come. He’ll just shout ‘bijlee’ which says ‘just lie down’ (Laughs) and again get up. So I went there without any kind of things. That was not the first time I went. I’ve been…I think about twenty-six years I went continuously, every year. And just my jeans and my T shirt and I had have my canvas jacket which I used to ride in South India. It's very good for the rain but suddenly I realized when you go to the cold, the damn canvas jacket gets colder than the atmosphere. (Laughs)

So I just went up and I went to Kanthi Sarovar. It was around three thirty in the afternoon; I just sat there and I didn’t know what hit me. I just sat there with my eyes open. It's an incredible glacier lake. It's a…as nature it's phenomenally beautiful. My eyes are open my mouth was shut but I could hear my voice singing loudly around me, very loudly like it's on a big microphone and I’m just looking. It's my voice clearly singing this chant. For the first time I’m hearing it but it's in my voice, but my mouth is clearly shut. So I sat there listening to this and that’s what we chanted just now. What it means is sound, nad means sound – sound is not an appropriate translation but in…in English language there is no appropriate word for nad. Nad is more than sound. Probably because there is no appropriate translations in English language similar things have happened. I think – are there any bible readers? Anybody? Nobody? Oh. I think the…I’ve not read but I’ve only heard from people that it seems the first part of the bible is about ‘first there was a word and the word was with God and the word is God’ something like this. Is that right? Somebody knows? Something like that.

See right now whatever I’m uttering right now I’m only making sounds but you are interpreting these sounds as words, isn't it? Yes?. I’m actually making only sound. Suppose I spoke in a language that you do not understand, the word would be sound and the sound would be word, isn't it, in your experience? Even now it is so but you think they are words. They are not words they’re just sounds. So, somewhere when it came to English language sound would sound too abstract. So somebody made word out of it. What is a sound becomes a word in the human mind but in the existence a sound is just a sound, isn't it? If there is nobody here in this hall, if I speak – it doesn’t matter in which language I speak – as far as the walls are concerned it's just a sound. Only if you come and sit here you invent the words out of the sound, isn't it?

So nad goes beyond sound. There’s no appropriate word but something more than sound because sound is not seen as a physical quantity. It is seen as the last…last bastion of physicality. In yoga we are looking at the sound as the last citadel of physicality; beyond that there is no physical. It means sound is everything and sound is life; all the life-forms are sound. Sound means a vibration. Today modern science physics is proving everything is just a reverberation in the existence. and what is karma and what is dharma means what entangles you is karma, what liberates you is dharma. Both are sound. What is bondage and what is liberation that is also sound. What is referred to as Shiva and Shakthi, that is also sound. Everything is sound. Whatever you know as physical creation is a sound because everything has a vibration. Where there’s a vibration there is a sound. Whether you can hear or not is the only question but there is a sound. Wherever there is a vibration there is a sound.